Semoran Blvd Visioning Plan

[Jernigan]

I stumbled upon this interesting plan through the City of Orlando's website. There is a short write-up and a series of links.

I thought the planning principals were all good, but once it got to the potential application of those principals, there were some big question marks.

Semoran Blvd. Project

[Jernigan]

Board Approves Plan For Massive Overhaul Of Orlando Street‎

[Jernigan]

Sentinel:

Upgrades planned for rundown stretch of Semoran Blvd. in Orlando

[Draculus]

Hundreds Of Volunteers Help Clean Up Semoran Blvd. Corridor

A volunteer group, Let's Clean Up Semoran, was out Saturday cleaning up garbage and picking up signs in hopes of cleaning up the run down image of Semoran Boulevard.

More:

http://www.clickorlando.com/news/27009022/detail.html

[nite owℓ]

Continuing the Semoran gateway makeover:

MPB Agenda shows a retail shopping center (featuring Target), restaurants & movie theater planned for the Lee Vista/S Semoran area near the airport.

[alex]

Continuing the Semoran gateway makeover:

MPB Agenda shows a retail shopping center (featuring Target), restaurants & movie theater planned for the Lee Vista/S Semoran area near the airport.

I'm glad they're building something, but doesn't it seem like they're going against everything the "vision plan" was hoping to achieve? I mean, are parking garages (or SoDo-style Target parking) that challenging? I do like the look of the proposed buildings, though.

[jack]

Challenging, no. Expensive, yes.

[kracker]

The work started on that project a few years ago and it was shelved due to the economy.

[Jernigan]

So there has been a lot of work going on so far in 2013 from Curry Ford to Colonial.

 

Replacement of wooden light posts with cement ones and a lot of sidewalk widening. 

 

They have been tearing up and replacing some medians but I'm not sure what the finished product will look like on those.  Right now it's just dirt wrapped in cement curbing (technical terms...).

 

This area has a LOT of people who bike and walk.  I hope they are able to get more bus shelters also as there are also plenty of people who are standing out waiting for Link 41 or Link 28 at any given time.

[Boomer136]

Digging up this fossil of a thread, in contrast to the importance of other projects going on, work has finally started at Michigan and Semoran at the old gas station clean up site and soon hopefully a Zaxby's will be there.

[spenser1058]

I've always supposed Semoran Blvd and visioning as something of an oxymoron...

[sunshine]

The effort they put into this is laughable compared to what they promised.

[HankStrong]

I actually liked the double-decking plan to 408.  However, it's not very reasonable to think it would ever happen.

[codypet]

On 3/12/2017 at 4:13 PM, Boomer136 said:

Digging up this fossil of a thread, in contrast to the importance of other projects going on, work has finally started at Michigan and Semoran at the old gas station clean up site and soon hopefully a Zaxby's will be there.

Didn't a Zaxby's open and go out of business like a block from there already?

Edit:  Nope, it was a KFC.

[jrs2]

They could have morphed Semoran ala US19 in Pinnellas from 408 to 528, as a pseudo limited access.  

Or, elevated (with dirt) limited access central spine with 3 + 3 lanes and only 2 + 2 surface street lanes on the edges, where the exits would be fewer than the number of larger intersections currently there.  

For example, place exits at 408, Curry Ford, Pershing, Gatlin, Lee Vista, 528.  Maybe even less exits than that.  All cross streets would remain.

How much wider would it need to be?  Just pave over the grass swaths and make them concrete tunnels with grates for drainage or whatever.

Right? Great.  Sounds like a plan.  Let's do it!

[metal93]

That can work for some stretches of Semoran, the ROW's wide enough to do it without too much demolition to nearby structures. I would imagine that all the interchanges would be single-point urban interchanges, those seem to take up the least space. I don't drive in that area often but it's pretty bad when I do, yet my least favorite part of Semoran is between 434 and 17-92, especially near the Altamonte Mall and I have to drive there frequently.

But what I really want to see is Maitland Boulevard/414 completely grade separated. I-4 Ultimate would partially do this, but it would be nice to have the ride from 441 to 17-92 without traffic lights, plus it's not too difficult seeing that the 414 is already somewhat limited access, is highway-like, and has plenty of ROW. I-4 Ultimate is elevating and removing the traffic lights on 414 at Maitland Summit, Keller, Lake Destiny, and the lights to the I-4 ramps. In the end, there will only be 5 traffic lights on the 414, and out of those, Maitland Avenue being the only major at-grade intersection.